Centralia Police Use Narcan, Save Overdose Victim

Less than a month after Lewis County law enforcement officers began carrying the opioid antidote naloxone, also known as Narcan, a Centralia police officer used the drug Monday to revive a woman believed to be overdosing on heroin.

At 12:46 a.m. on Tuesday, an officer responded to the 800 block of Euclid Way in Centralia to a report of a suspected heroin overdose.

The officer arrived to find a 36-year-old woman who was not breathing and had no pulse.

The officer administered the Narcan and began CPR. The woman began breathing and was transported to Providence Centralia Hospital.

Centralia and Chehalis police departments and the Lewis County Sheriff’s Office announced in late August that the three departments would begin carrying the drug thanks to a $3,000 grant Lewis County Public Health and Social Services by the West Region EMS Trauma & Care Council in collaboration with the University of Washington’s Alcohol & Drug Abuse Institute.

Centralia Police Chief Carl Nielsen said officers very recently received training and began carrying the overdose antidote.